Tech

Tidal, the high-fidelity music streaming service majority owned by Jack Dorsey-led digital payments company Block, has laid off more than 10% its staff, representing about 40 staffers who have been let go. The cuts at Tidal are part of Block’s stated goal of capping its total employee base at 12,000. As of Dec. 31, 2022,

Telecom giant Verizon hired Leslie Berland, previously the top marketing exec at Peloton and Twitter, as CMO. Berland will assume the role of executive VP and chief marketing officer at Verizon, effective Jan. 9, 2024. She’ll report directly to Hans Vestberg, Verizon chairman and CEO. Berland takes over the CMO role from Diego Scotti, who

Get ready to see “The Kardashians” standing next to Baby Yoda on your Disney+ home screen. Beginning Dec. 6, the significant majority of Hulu content will be available on Disney+ in the U.S. for subscribers of both services. It’s phase one of the Disney+/Hulu integration plan, first outlined by CEO Bob Iger earlier this year.

Humorist and writer Andy Borowitz has gotten the axe from the New Yorker after 25 years of writing for the magazine, as part of a larger wave of cost-cutting and layoffs at parent Condé Nast. Borowitz announced that the New Yorker was dropping his long-running Borowitz Report satire features because of “its financial difficulties.” In

Selena Gomez had TikTok users engaged the most over the past year, according to a report released by the social video-sharing platform. Gomez, who has almost 60 million followers, was crowned TikTok’s most popular artist in the United States. The multi-hyphenate, who regularly posts using the viral sounds du jour, leads the pack of musicians

Trevor Jacob, a YouTube creator and former Olympic snowboarding athlete, was sentenced to six months in federal prison for “obstructing a federal investigation” by “deliberately destroying the wreckage of an airplane that he intentionally crashed in Santa Barbara County to gain online views,” prosecutors said. Jacob, 30, of Lompoc, Calif., had pleaded guilty on June

Former “Good Morning America” hosts Amy Robach and T.J. Holmes have addressed their ouster from the ABC News morning show for the first time — on a new podcast that debuted a year to the day after the network suspended them. “The best way to sum us up, Amy and T.J., is that we’re the

Former “Good Morning America” hosts Amy Robach and T.J. Holmes have addressed their ouster from the ABC News morning show for the first time — on a new podcast that debuted a year to the day after the network suspended them. “The best way to sum us up, Amy and T.J., is that we’re the

Singapore’s Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA) is teaming with AI Singapore and the Agency for Science, Technology and Research to launch the S$70 million ($52.3 million) National Multimodal LLM Program (NMLP). The initiative, funded by Singapore’s National Research Foundation, will develop the country’s research and engineering capabilities in multi-modal large language (LLM) models. It will

It’s a wonderful… robot? An AI-generated voice of Jimmy Stewart, the legendary Hollywood actor who died in 1997, reads a new bedtime story on the Calm sleep and meditation app. The voice of Stewart, who starred in films including “It’s a Wonderful Life,” “Vertigo” and “Rear Window,” was recreated for the Calm story using AI

More than 10 years after Grand Theft Auto V first came out, the first look at the long-awaited and highly anticipated sequel, Grand Theft Auto VI, has officially been released. Rockstar Games dropped the first trailer to the massively hyped video game on Monday night after it first leaked online. Fans will have to wait

Director Lukas Dhont is the new guest curator for Galerie, Indian Paintbrush’s digital film club. Dhont, whose 2022 coming-of-age film “Close” was nominated for best international feature, names 18 films that influenced him the most for Galerie members. Among the entries is the 1975 documentary “Grey Gardens.” “A teacher in film school showed us ‘Grey

Verizon is making its latest aggressive push to bundle up streaming packages — offering ad-supported versions of Netflix and Warner Bros. Discovery’s Max for $10 per month to wireless subscribers on unlimited plans. That’s about a 40% discount on the services compared with the $17/month it would cost to purchase them separately. Under such reseller

Spotify is laying off 17% of its global workforce in order to cut costs, CEO Daniel Ek said on Monday. According to the Financial Times, Ek made the announcement in an internal memo sent to staff. “I recognize this will impact a number of individuals who have made valuable contributions,” Ek wrote in the memo.

In its never-ending effort to try to reach younger news consumers, CNN has launched CNN Shorts — a new vertical video player on its website designed for smartphones. CNN already produces vertical-video news briefs for platforms including TikTok, YouTube Shorts and Instagram Reels. Now it sees a growing opportunity for CNN Shorts on its owned-and-operated

Blac Chyna was among the highest earners on OnlyFans, reportedly making millions per month on the adult-content-friendly creator subscription platform. But the model, rapper, TV personality and influencer, whose real name is Angela White, quit OnlyFans earlier this year — saying at the time that it was a “dead end” for her and that she

Elon Musk this week angrily told big advertisers like Disney and Apple who have halted spending on X/Twitter to “go fuck yourself.” Bill Ackman, head of investment holding company Pershing Square Holdings, believes Musk has a point — opining that large marketers employ a double standard in reacting to Musk’s combative rhetoric and his “free

TikTok users in Big Sky Country are free — for now — to keep watching short-form videos on the app in the new year. A federal judge issued a preliminary injunction Thursday blocking Montana’s first-of-its-kind U.S. ban of TikTok in the state, ruling that the law set to take effect Jan. 1, 2024, likely was

New rounds of layoffs took place Thursday at Condé Nast and Vox Media, the latest cutbacks in the publishing sector as companies look to tighten their belts. The job cuts at Condé Nast come after the company said earlier this month that it will lay off upwards of 300 employees, representing 5% of total headcount,

Linda Yaccarino, who’s already facing an uphill battle in winning over advertisers to X, has her work cut out for her to restore trust with big marketers after her boss profanely dissed those who had suspended advertising from the platform. Almost six months into her gig as CEO of X, Yaccarino continues to try to

Tubi, Fox Corp.’s ad-supported video-on-demand service, is eyeing a bigger international footprint: The streamer has tapped David Salmon, former CTO of Endeavor Streaming, as executive VP and managing director of international. Salmon, based in the U.K., will report to Tubi CEO Anjali Sud, the ex-chief exec of Vimeo who started at the streamer in September.

Saudi-owned MBC Group, the Middle East’s top broadcaster, has announced it is floating a 10% stake on the Riyadh stock exchange seeking to raise up to 831 million riyals ($222 million) in a move to boost growth and help fuel its output of high-end productions. “Institutional and retail investors will be allowed the opportunity to

A visibly irate Elon Musk said advertisers who pulled spending from X/Twitter, following his post that endorsed an antisemitic conspiracy theory, were trying to “blackmail” the company and threatened to drive it into bankruptcy. Musk, currently the world’s wealthiest individual, had a message to big advertisers including Disney that halted spending on his social network:

Netflix‘s games strategy is getting a nitro boost from Rockstar Games’ crime-tastic Grand Theft Auto series, one of the best-selling video-game franchises of all time. The three classic titles in “Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy – The Definitive Edition” will be available Dec. 14 for Netflix customers at no additional charge on mobile platforms. Starting

Jezebel is getting resurrected, under new management. Three weeks ago, the former owner of the feminist news and opinion site, private-equity backed G/O Media, announced it was shuttering Jezebel — and laying off the staff — after failing to find a buyer. Now Paste Magazine, an Atlanta-based entertainment and culture publication, has snapped up Jezebel,

NBCUniversal’s Peacock streaming service is flying into Instacart‘s virtual grocery cart. The companies announced a new deal that makes Peacock Premium available to all subscribers of Instacart+ in the U.S. at no additional cost. Instacart+, which provides unlimited free delivery on orders of more than $35 and other perks, costs $99/year or $9.99/month. NBCU wouldn’t

Controversial podcaster Joe Rogan reliably generates a large and bro-heavy audience for Spotify. But will his show remain exclusively available on Spotify? “The Joe Rogan Experience,” exclusive to Spotify under a 2020 deal, again clocked in with the most popular show on the platform for 2023. The company revealed the top 25 rankings for the

Alex Cooper and Matt Kaplan have tapped Mina Lefevre as the chief content officer of Television of their newly formed media company, Trending. Lefevre will report to Kaplan and oversee creative, and strategic oversight for the company (ACE Entertainment, The Unwell Network and Call Her Daddy) in scripted and unscripted. “I am thrilled to be

Apple has announced the most popular podcasts of 2023 — and true crime once again leads the pack. Audiochuck’s long-running “Crime Junkie,” hosted by Ashley Flowers and Brit Prawat, was the No. 1 most-listened to podcast overall on Apple Podcasts in the U.S., according to the tech giant. The true-crime podcast topped the U.S. chart

Bytedance, the unlisted Chinese tech giant that owns TikTok, is poised to slash most of its games operations, including Nuverse, which publishes ‘Marvel Snap.’ “We regularly review our businesses and make adjustments to center on long-term strategic growth areas,” a ByteDance representative said in a statement by a Bytedance spokesman that was sent to Variety.